Lagos State Governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu, on Saturday announced that the State Government will be offsetting the medical bills of any patient admitted into the State-owned healthcare facilities during the ongoing 14-day lockdown.

Sanwo-Olu made announcement during a briefing after the State’s Security Council meeting held at the State House in Marina.

The new palliative scheme, Sanwo-Olu said, will cover the medical equipment expenses of pregnant women on maternity delivery and other categories of patients in emergency, casualty cases, laboratory testing and surgeries.

“Lagos State Government will, for the duration of the restriction on movement, be taking full responsibility for the medical bills of all patients who fall in the following categories at all Lagos State-owned secondary healthcare facilities.

“The first category are patients in emergency, casualty cases, including registration, laboratory tests, surgeries, and drugs. Those in the second category are maternity cases. We will bear the full cost of pregnant women on normal delivery and Caesarean sections in our hospitals in this period of lockdown.

“What this new scheme means is that, at this time, patients with the listed medical conditions will not need to pay to access treatment and care in all our 27 General Hospitals across the State,” he said.

Sanwo-Olu disclosed that the restrictive measures had started to pay off, stressing that lockdown had afforded the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) to keep up and make appropriate progress in tracing of contacts.

“The restrictions have started paying off; the Nigeria Center for Disease Control has told us that they have been able to take advantage of the absence of traffic on our roads to make appreciable progress in their contact tracing.

“All patients in the State’s isolation centres are doing well and recovering faster despite the surge in Covid-19 case in Lagos. A patient was discharged on Saturday afternoon, making it 24 COVID-19 patients treated and released by the State,” the Governor said.